


The Library

by two_drama_nerds_in_a_boat



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Library, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst, Annabeth is a writer, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/F, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hunters of Artemis, Kissing, Slow Burn, Thalia and Annabeth are roommates, The Hunters of Artemis is Thalia's girl band, There will be fluff eventually but you have to suffer first, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:27:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22311739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/two_drama_nerds_in_a_boat/pseuds/two_drama_nerds_in_a_boat
Summary: Piper's life is full of Temporaries.Temporary Scandals, Temporary People. She tells herself that she can't get attached to anything, because everything is a Temporary.But then one day, she's at the public library, and she sees a girl writing something on a computer.Porn.It's porn.And Piper knows this girl's a Temporary, and Piper knows she shouldn't stick her nose into other peoples' business, but Piper's curious.(Slow Burn, read the tags for other things I found Important).
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Piper McLean
Comments: 9
Kudos: 33





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot this was supposed to be a oneshot...

Piper likes going to the library. 

It tends to be a nice, quiet place where people were allowed to sit and read as much as they like, for as long as they like, and even though Piper isn’t the biggest reader, she still enjoys being there. Because if people read, they generally aren’t the type to watch movies as often, and if they don’t watch movies then they don’t know her dad, and if they don’t know her dad, well, she’s pretty safe from the paparazzi. At least temporarily. 

Piper has grown up surrounded by different versions of temporaries. 

Her mom was a temporary. The woman was a supermodel that had sex with Piper’s dad once and somehow Piper came into existence and, well, as soon as the pregnancy was done with, Piper’s mom disappeared. 

Her first boyfriend was a temporary. He was a sweet guy named Jason, with blond hair and blue eyes and a sense of humor that made Piper smile every time. They’d lasted a couple years, but then he died in some freak accident or another. The writers of those tabloid newspapers turned it into this big scandal. Piper’s over it now. Her feelings were temporary too, and her loss was temporary. 

Her first girlfriend was a temporary as well, she supposes, only lasting a month before Piper found out the girl was cheating on her. Piper shook her feelings for the bitch away, and she made sure to not let anyone hurt her like that again. It was hard, and Piper cried, and the tabloids had another field day. But just like Jason, Piper lived and learned. 

So now she’s escaping the paparazzi temporarily, by hiding in-between stacks of books in the nonfiction section, the ones that no one ever checks out because they’re boring and smell of piss or shit- at least to some extent. Piper sits in this specific spot often, back to the wall, studying the titles of the books on the shelves in front of her. She finds it relaxing. The paparazzi can’t find her when she’s surrounded by piss-and-shit-books. The piss-and-shit-books have become her greatest allies. 

She likes them a lot. 

And so when she sits here, she falls into a daze. She doesn’t go on her phone much in the library, because she feels like an intruder when she does this. To Piper, it feels wrong to do just about anything electronically in the library. Unless, that is, you’re using a library computer. They’re clunky old Dells, dinosaurs really. Museum-worthy. Boxy, grey, relatively useless. Piper tried to log on to one of them, once. She got as far as google chrome before all of the systems shut down and a bright red error message appeared on screen. Basically, she broke the computer and had to hold her head in shame as a library intern came to take the computer away. 

Piper still looks at the computers. Sometimes. But she doesn’t like to touch them. After she killed one, she’s hesitant to shoot down yet another brave old soldier. (Even if that soldier happens to be a dinosaur masquerading as a computer). The good thing about the spot between the piss-and-shit-books is that she has a perfect view of the computer desks, all nice and orderly, standing in a row. She can see everyone who sits there. They just can’t see her. Something about the angels of the piss-and-shit-books, the way they’re stacked on the shelves. 

Not that it matters much though; no one ever sits there. 

And so Piper lets herself space out. 

“Dammit,” hisses a voice from the computer desk. 

And Piper looks up. 

It’s a blonde, sitting at the computer, staring angrily at the keyboard. Piper can’t see her face, but she knows it’s a girl by her figure and the ponytail. Who else would care enough about their hair to keep it up in fucking princess curls? Some guy? Nope. The blonde’s cursing now, at both the keyboard and the screen. Piper must say, she’s slightly amazed by this princess’s abilities. It’s clear that the other girl has pulled up a full Word document, and the computer is obviously still running. Piper winces as she imagines what would happen if she were to get so far as a Word document. The computer would probably blow up. 

_ Would the tabloids blow up,  _ Piper wonders,  _ if I were to talk to this girl? _

Silently, Piper stands. The girl at the computer looks so focused on whatever she’s typing into the word document. Piper wonders how long she’s been there, just writing away. Was Piper here first? Did the girl sit down and start writing only a few minutes ago? Or has she been there the entire time, and Piper was just too stressed out to realize it? She’s a pretty noisy typer. The sound of the keys clicking blurs together into one hum. This girl types fast, faster than Piper ever could, with her hunting and pecking. Piper wants to know more about this girl, she realizes. This scares her, a bit.

Piper tries not to think about it. Whatever’s going on, it’s just going to become another temporary eventually. 

“What the fuck-” Piper’s eyes scan the document on the screen. “Jesus Christ, you’re writing porn.”

The blonde turns around. Gray eyes meet Piper’s as she finally sees the face of the girl at the computer desk. 

The girl must be furious, because she immediately snaps. “Why were you reading over my shoulder?”

“I- er, well you see- it’s just, you looked so entranced by whatever you were writing-” Piper’s eyes jump to the computer screen again, and she gasps, reading aloud straight from the blonde’s own words. “Hm. ‘...slowly, with much grace and majesty, she removed her lover’s bra…’ Wait, you’re writing lesbian porn fanfiction?”

Before Piper can speak again, the blonde is closing the document and logging out of the computer simultaneously, like something from a spy movie.

“Why does it matter?” She asks, her gray eyes boring into Piper, tearing her apart with sheer will. Piper feels like everything she says to the blonde is being recorded inside of the other girl’s mind, memorized, deconstructed, and turned into a weapon of war. 

“I… well you see, I was just- you were muttering, and typing-”

The blonde chews her bottom lip, tugging on a stray piece of her hair in concentration. And then, out of nowhere, she says, “I don’t know you, do I?”

Piper blinks. “Um…”

_ She’s gonna recognize me, _ Piper thinks.  _ She’s gonna tell someone, or the paparazzi are gonna find out, and I’ll be blamed or something, and this girl, this fucking hot girl, she’s going to be my downfall.  _

“Annabeth. Annabeth Chase?” She says. “Oh, nevermind. I don’t know you. Why would I? You’re probably just some perv who happened to be reading over my shoulder.” She gets up to leave. “If anyone asks, this never happened. None of it. Ever.”

Piper’s mind is racing. “Wait,” she shouts, a little too loud for the library. Heads turn towards Piper and the blonde -  _ Annabeth _ , Piper thinks - and a few elderly women glare in their direction. A middle-aged librarian points to a sign that says something like ‘Please Respect The Studious Environment Of The Library’ and then goes back to stamping books.

“What,” spits Annabeth, under her breath. 

Piper walks over to her slowly, and then grabs her by the arm, pulling the blonde into her own personal corner. The one with the piss-and-shit-books. 

Annabeth wrinkles her nose. “It smells like actual shit back here.”

“Don’t worry,” Piper says quickly. “It’s a temporary.”

“A tempor- what the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“Nevermind.”

“Why did you pull me into this shit corner?”

Piper realizes she’s still holding on to Annabeth’s arm, and pulls away. They stand awkwardly for a moment. Neither of them are willing to break the silence. 

“Seriously. This corner smells like piss. And shit. Why are we back here? I have to go somewhere.”

“I-” Piper takes a deep breath in, the way her therapist has been telling her to. “I was wondering…” she trails off. She’s talking to a pretty girl. Like, a really pretty girl. A really really really pretty girl, with blonde princess hair and gray strategist eyes, and a tan that belongs to someone from California. And all she can think about is what this particular pretty girl was writing. 

Annabeth looks at her shoes. “Spit it out.”

“When you were writing that thing,” Piper says, “the thing I read over your shoulder… is it actually like that?”

“Like what?” Annabeth looks genuinely confused, like Piper is speaking gibberish. Of course, Annabeth’s confusion is temporary. Because Piper answers. 

“Sex. Is sex actually like that?”

Annabeth laughs. “How would I know?”

“You’re the one writing it!” Piper shouts, again too loud for the library. But because they’re in the piss-and-shit-books section, no one is there to hear them, and because no one is there to hear them, no one actually cares. 

“And why would you ask me something like that anyway?” Annabeth continues, acting as if her last question was a rhetorical. “I mean… what… you want to learn?”

“Learn what?”

“About sex.”

Piper blushes. “I- er- you see, um, Annabeth… no! No, it’s not like- no!”

Annabeth laughs again, a sort of broken, careless laugh, and pushes Piper further into the corner, up against the piss-and-shit-books, and whispers in her ear. 

“Are you sure?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this... isn't a oneshot, anymore.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeet.

“Um…”

Piper is speechless. When was the last time she was like this? 

Jason? Was it Jason?

Piper tries not to think about Jason. She’s over him. He’s dead. And she is in the corner with the piss-and-shit books, and a pretty girl, Annabeth, inches away. For a moment, Piper is sure Annabeth plans to make a move, and this intrigues her. Sure, Piper is scared, too. Scared of someone seeing, scared of this being the cover of the tabloids for the next week. She cringes as she imagines the headlines. But at the same time, Piper’s intrigued. 

And just as Piper’s sure Annabeth is going to make a move, the blonde steps away. 

“I’m stupid,” she mutters. “Absolutely stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

And Annabeth walks away. 

“Wait!” Says Piper, shouting after her. “Annabeth, wait! Please come back.”

Annabeth pretends not to notice Piper. Or maybe Annabeth isn’t paying attention at all. Piper can hear her muttering things under her breath- “I was an idiot to think she’d actually be gay,” and “Just another straight girl, here to fuck with my feelings.” Everyone in the library is watching them now, but Piper doesn’t really care. 

“Annabeth!” Piper shouts again. Piper watches as the other girl storms away. She’s heading for the exit. So Piper calls for her once more, and though Annabeth’s hands have balled up into fists, she turns to face McLean. 

“ _ What _ .”

Piper winces. The word was spat as if it were poison, lethal and full of hate and betrayal. But then Piper reminds herself that this girl might be worth the poison. 

Even if she is just another temporary, Piper thinks, at least I would have a friend.

Or more than a friend? Is that something Annabeth could become?

Piper forces herself to make eye contact with Annabeth. She remembers that that’s something people do when trying to make new friends. Piper pulls a pen out of her pocket, and dashes to the librarians’ desk for a piece of scrap paper. The same librarian that hushed them earlier glares at Piper. Piper pretends that he’s not there. 

“Here… um… here… just… here. Take this,” Piper says, jotting her number down on the paper and handing it to Annabeth. “Call me..? Actually, no, don’t… don’t call me… I’m no… I’m not good, over the phone…” she’s stuttering now, and her eyes have fallen back to her feet, and Annabeth obviously feels that the awkwardness is painful. 

“You want me to call you?” Asks Annabeth, raising an eyebrow.

“Well… don’t call me… I get nervous, around phone calls…” When Piper looks back up at Annabeth, she can see her smirk. “Are you… laughing?”

“No,” she says. “But I might have been about to.” 

Annabeth takes the number from Piper’s hands, and then she walks out the door of the library. 

Piper watches as she leaves. And once Annabeth’s out the door, Piper falls down to her knees on the ground. She puts her head in her hands and just sits and thinks. The people around her don’t notice - they’re too busy with their own lives. But Piper’s world is spinning and whirling and it’s been turned all the way upside down. 

She tells herself it’s temporary. 

_ It’s temporary.  _

It won’t last. It  _ didn’t  _ last. That girl - Annabeth - she left. Just now. Out the door of the library, 

She’s trying to reassure herself. 

But it’s not working. 

Because Piper doesn’t want Annabeth to be a temporary. She wants to see her tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day, and the next. She wants to text her and tell her about her day. She wants to meet her in the library again, sometime soon. 

_ This is ridiculous,  _ Piper reminds herself.  _ She’s some random porno fic writer that you met for the first time today at the library. You only just learned her name. You barely even know her.  _

But there’s another little voice in the back of her head. It whispers things like,  _ But this girl is beautiful and cunning and seems to be rather clever, and isn’t that what you need in your life? _ __  
_  
_ __ How long has it been since I’ve wanted to see a person?  Piper wonders. She’s trying to remember, but she can’t. She realizes that Annabeth is the first person she’s felt compelled to interact with in months. 

Piper goes catches the bus home, hiding her face behind a cheap local paper she picked up on her way out of the library. No surprise, her dad’s there in the ‘Entertainment’ section, the critics already finding different ways to ruin him with their reviews. Piper skips those articles. She turns to the comics, and tries to find something she can laugh at. But the only thing on her mind is that girl from the library. 

She checks her phone for a text, a call, an email,  _ anything.  _

She has one new message. 

She opens the app, clicking on the only new notification. 

**_Dad:_ ** _ Hey sweetie! I won’t be making it home tonight after all - they just told me they want me to stay another couple of nights to shoot some final scenes. I should still be home soon. Miss you! _

She groans. 

Of course it’s from her dad. 

Piper crumples up the newspaper into an angry little ball, tossing it aside, letting her face show on the public bus. She’s decided that, for the moment, she doesn’t care if the gossip columnists know that the mighty Piper McLean is using public transport. 

She holds onto her phone, hoping that Annabeth will text her soon. 

_ Please text soon.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we love pining after someone we just met don't we lads


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i would like to thank the universe for giving me gremlin hands with which i can type the words.

Annabeth gets back to her apartment at seven. Thalia’s still not home yet, but Percy’s sitting on the couch, on his phone. Probably looking at memes, knowing him, or reviewing videos of his latest swim meet. 

“Yo,” he says, setting his phone aside. “How was work?”

Annabeth walks past him, going straight into the kitchen to grab a chocolate bar from one of the cupboards before collapsing on the tile floor. “If by ‘work’ you mean ‘writing weird porno for folks on the Internet for the worst commission rates ever in the hopes that it will help pay rent’ then the answer is horrible. Awful. A disaster. A complete tragedy.” 

“Aw,” he pouts. She watches him sit up, turning around with his legs crossed so that he can face her. “What happened?”

“Some girl read over my shoulder.”

Percy’s eyes widen. “No.”

“Yes.” 

“Oh god.” Percy’s shaking his head, as if he’s saying no to something. Annabeth thinks maybe he’s just trying to reject her awkward second-hand embarrassment. It doesn’t seem to be working. “Pass me the cake,” he says. “It’s in the fridge.”

“Cake?”

“I need to eat comfort food as I listen to what is definitely going to be an atrociously embarrassing story.”

Annabeth stands up, opening the fridge door. “Atrociously? That’s a big word, for you.” 

“Says the one with dyslexia.” 

“Percy, we both have dyslexia.” 

“Yet only one of us decided to become a writer,” Percy says. “My dear Annabeth, how the irony suits you.” 

“Oh shut up. Or else you’re not getting cake.” 

She sifts through the contents of the fridge. There’s a few eggs in a carton, a jug of milk, some fruit in the crisper. 

“Where is it?”

“In the tupperware,” Percy says with a wave of his hand. “It has a red lid.” 

Annabeth sees it, and her face crinkles up. “That’s supposed to be cake?”

“Yeah. What about it?”

“It looks like someone threw up an entire jar of blue icing, and then molded it into something vaguely brick-shaped and called it a confectionary treat.” 

“Be nice, now,” Percy says. “That’s Thalia’s work there.” 

“Thalia can bake?” Annabeth takes the cake out of the fridge, closing the door with her foot as she opens a drawer and looks for a fork. 

“Not really,” Percy says. “But she tried and that’s what matters. Plus, she even made it blue for me.” 

Annabeth rolls her eyes, but she can’t help but smile. “Okay, all of our forks and spoons are in the dishwasher. How do you feel about eating cake with chopsticks?”

She watches his entire face light up. “Like a pioneer of a brave new way to revolutionize cake eating forever.” 

“That’s the spirit.”

She brings him the cake in the tupperware and the chopsticks and then she sits down next to him on the sofa. She grabs herself one of the blankets and wraps it around her shivering form. It’s only autumn, but it’s getting colder every day, and the cold becomes ever so much more noticeable when you and your roommate can’t afford to pay for heat. 

“So,” says Percy. “What, pray tell, happened at the library?”

Annabeth groans. “You’re never gonna let me go unless I explain, aren’t you?”

“You know me so well.” 

So Annabeth sits and explains. She tells Percy how everything went wrong, starting with exposition - Annabeth’s a writer, after all, and though she knows some people prefer to jump right into the action, she feels the need to set the scene first - so she tells him how she finished up at school and she was walking to her normal library, but that one was closed for construction (“Even though they weren’t supposed to start renovations until December!”) and so she had to go to one of the other ones that wasn’t as close by, a branch she’s never been to before, where the computers are clunky old beasts from before the dinosaurs roamed the Earth, but at least there was free WiFi. 

“And so I was at one of the computers, one of the ones in the back, y’know, so that people wouldn’t see me, and I just started writing. My normal routine. I went onto my blog and I looked to see who’d commissioned what and I checked that they PayPal-ed me the right amount and then I just started writing.” 

“I see.”

“And then, out of nowhere, this brunette just waltzes over to me and starts reading over my fucking shoulder.”

Percy’s eyes go big. He shoves some of that awful cake into his mouth. “Do go on.” 

“Well… she was pretty, and she seemed kind enough. And normally I would have logged out of my account as soon as I heard someone behind me.” 

“But?”

“But…” Annabeth blushes. “Well, she caught me off guard, is all!”

“Off-guard?”

“Off-guard.”

“So she was pretty?” Says Percy, wearing a shit-eating grin. 

“Oh shut up.” 

“She was very pretty,” says Percy. “I know it’s true. I can see it on your face. We’ve been best friends since middle school, you know you can’t hide jack from me, Annie. So then what happened?”

Annabeth shrugs. “She… well, she seemed really surprised that I was writing porn.” 

“Oh my god,” Percy’s trying so hard to stop himself from laughing. “Please tell me you were writing some really dirty, kinky, absolutely filthy lesbian erotica. Please. Please tell me you at least had the characters tying each other up.” Percy’s practically squealing. “Please tell me she read a substantial amount of it, Annie I’m begging you.”

“She read… enough of it,” says Annabeth. “I don’t know exactly how much.” 

“And was it horrible? Was it BDSM? Was there a mommy kink?”

“Why are you so interested in this?”

“Because I need something to lighten my mood, so I’m watching your life like a sitcom. Now explain.” 

Annabeth sighs. “It was… pretty bad, yeah. It was lesbian erotica. ‘Course it’s pretty much always lesbian erotic that people have me writing. And there was bondage and stuff involved, and it was one of my more generous commissioners, so I wrote exactly what they wanted.”

“Oh. My. God.” 

Annabeth groans, covering her face with her blanket. “I don’t want to talk about it.” 

“But there’s more, isn’t there?”

“Of course there’s more,” Annabeth says, her voice muffled from under the blanket. “Because why would my life ever be fucking normal?”

“You’re obligated to continue.” 

Annabeth does. She tells Percy about how she logged off the computer, but it was too late, because that girl - Piper? Was that her name? - had already seen enough, and how Annabeth had been a fucking idiot and given that girl her name, for no reason other than the fact that she was caught off guard and Annabeth could never function normally around pretty girls, no. And she says how the girl asked Annabeth if sex was really like that - 

“No,” Percy gasps. 

“Yes.” 

“Annie, your life is the most interesting sitcom I’ve ever watched.” 

“And then,” says Annabeth, her tone dripping with sarcasm, “because I’m an absolute genius, I backed her up against a wall and asked her if she wanted me to show her what sex was like.”

“You’re a disaster bisexual, Annabeth,” Percy says. 

“Right back at you, Percy Jackson.” 

“Touché.”

“And then I saw her start to stutter and I ran away,” Annabeth says. “And then,” she continues, facepalming at her own stupidity, “and then she chased after me and she scribbled down her number on a piece of paper and gave it to me. And then I ran away again. Because I am the ultimate pussy.” 

“Wow,” says Percy. “Wow.”

There’s a sound of keys turning in the lock, and Thalia enters the apartment. 

“Wow what?”

“Annie’s a master disaster bisexual,” Percy says. 

“Annabeth, why are you hiding under a blanket?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“How was band rehearsal?” Asks Percy.

Thalia shrugs, sitting down on the couch on the other side of Annabeth. “It was pretty good. We’ve got a set list figured out, so now all we need is someone willing to let us play a gig somewhere.”

“Maybe you need a cooler name.”

“I think ‘The Hunters of Artemis’ is a pretty rad name for a punk rock band.” 

“I second that,” comes Annabeth’s reply from under the blanket. 

“Annie, you can’t be a part of this conversation unless you leave your cozy little home and tell Thalia what went down at the library.”

Annabeth groans. 

“Oh come on,” says Thalia. “It couldn’t have been that bad.” 

Annabeth takes the blanket off her head. “There was a pretty girl that saw me writing porn and then I acted like a complete fool around the pretty girl and then she gave me her number but I haven’t called it because I’m a pussy.” 

“Well,” says Thalia, “as a proud lesbian that somehow managed to get a girlfriend despite being incredibly stupid, I’m gonna give you a few words of advice: If the pretty girl gave you her number, even after witnessing your idiocy, you must’ve made quite the good impression on her. And she definitely wants you to call her. So do me a favor and call the number, will ya?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tell me what you think in the comments :D


End file.
